We are living through an era of exceptionally punitive immigration enforcement policies. No one is spared, not even children who are detained inside family detention centers in Texas that reopened this year as a part of the Trump administration’s aggressive mass deportation agenda. As a general practice, gamily detention is not new. But to understand what is new under this administration, how detained families are being treated right now, and to explore how we should grapple with the moral implications of family detention, I spoke with Javier Hidalgo and Faisal Al-Juburi from RAICES Texas.
RAICES Texas provides pro bono legal support for immigrant families, coordinates strategic advocacy efforts, and provides grounded moral clarity about the harms our country is inflicting through the unnecessary and abusive system of family detention. As Javier said, this work isn’t about winning every cases—the system is too stacked against immigrants for that to happen. Instead, it’s about doing as much as possible to advocate for the well-being of these families and bearing witness so that these stories are not forgotten.
I am grateful to Javier and Faisal for spending an hour with me and for engaging generously with the large audience that showed up for the discussion. I learned so much from both of them, and I am sure you will, too. Even if you remember family detention under the Obama administration and first Trump administration, this conversation offers updated insights that I think you will find valuable. Please listen and share widely.
If you would like to get in touch with RAICES Texas for media inquiries, Faisal is the person to talk to. Send emails to media@raicestexas.org and he reassured us that he will make sure it ends up in the right place. In his closing comments, Faisal also encouraged us to “follow the money” and pointed us to a recent article in the Miami Herald that does exactly that: “Florida’s GEO Group plays central role in Trump’s mass deportation plan” by Shirsho Dasgupta.
See the original event announcement for more information about Javier and Faisal.
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